January 24, 2008 9:36 AM
Today I taught my second class on immigration law at Hofstra. This class gives an overview of the immigration system. At the end of the class some of the students were scratching their heads over the way some of our politicians talk about immigration.
We've all heard the criticism of illegal immigrants by pols calling for them to leave the country and get on line to come here "just like everybody else." As my students found out today, for most illegal immigrants there just isn't a line.
Most people immigrate to the U.S. in one of four ways. They come through Family Immigration, Employment-Based Immigration, as Refugees, or through the Diversity lottery. Let me explain briefly how each of these works.
To come as a family-based immigrant, a close relative who is a U.S. citizen or Lawful Permanent Resident has to apply for you. Now we're not talking uncles and aunts, or grandparents here. Generally it must be your spouse or parent or in some cases your sibling or child who applies for you. Waiting times to process these applications range from several months to more than a decade. And, if you don't have the right relatives, you can't come in this way at all.
The next way to come here is through employment. The problem is that this only allows highly educated folks in through this channel. For example, a doctor could get a "green card" this way, but a landscaper couldn't.
Next are refugees. This is a humane system if you come from a war torn country like Chad and can demonstrate that you have been persecuted, but few undocumented immigrants are from places that are at war.
Finally there are those who come in through the Diversity Lottery. This sounds like it should be an alternative to coming illegally until you realize that the Diversity desired by this program is a Whiter immigrant flow. The biggest group of "Diversity" visas are set aside for Europeans and Mexicans are barred from applying for them!
And that's it.
If you think of the popular image of the undocumented immigrant, he or she is not ever going to qualify for legal residence under any of the categories. Telling people to go home and "Get in line" is nothing less than a public confession of ignorance.